Wednesday, May 31, 2006

Vinod Mehta accuses the Indian India's 'smug, selfish, self-centered, satiated middle class, fattened on the fruits of the booming economy' of keeping their "Eyes. Ears and Minds Closed." Beginning with a disclaimer that the intention was not to defend Arjun Singh nor the new quota regime, but ends up doing precisely the 'unintended.'

Mr. Mehta and almost all of the pro-reservation brigade fail comprehend the Indian middle class' (which they for their ease of argument will always prefer to be identified as exclusively upper-caste) ire against reservation. Their hackneyed response is that the upper castes do not want to give up their 'stranglehold' on higher education and well paying jobs and therefore they protest.

Though I may not be in sync with the beliefs of all the anti-reservation protestors around the country, but I don't think that any of them are against the idea of 'affirmative action' to use the US terminology or 'positive discrimination' as the Brits say it. The anger is directed against the flawed policy of reservations which this country has been practicing unsuccessfully for the last 60 years. 60 years is a long time.

Coming back to Mr. Mehta, he is under the assumption that the current reservation policy is a poverty alleviation scheme. It is nothing but a vote-amassing activity continued shamelessly by successive governments lacking in the ability to do something more proactive to bring the downtrodden to the mainstream. Better educational facilities at the primary and the secondary levels would reap more benefits which no reservation policy can even dream of. Moreover Outlook's Editor-in-Chief would like us to believe that all 900 million of India's poor can be fitted into the three brackets of SC, ST and OBC. The so called forward castes are non-poor by merit of their caste.

Mr. Mehta threatens that in absence of reservation the poor would take the red road. Will the present reservation policy eliminate poverty? What use is reservation to people without access to even basic education? The rising literacy rate is a hoax, it doesn't translate to employability. We first need to ensure that.

Going into a self-contradictory mode, the master of Editor - the four-legged tail wagging sensible creature - with reference to a previous cover story of the magazine asserts that affirmative action in the form of reservation will do as much good in India as it did in the United States. What Mr. Mehta forgets, and I quote from the same cover story that he was referring to:

Exemplifying 49.5 to 69.5 percent reservations in the Southern states, Mr. Mehta asks, "Are we to assume that engineers, doctors, MBAs from these southern states are substandard?" The answer, Sir, is available in the lists that you and your rival publications attempt to aggregate every year. Most institutes from southern India which make it to the top do not practice reservation policy to the extent that you mentioned and for those who do, please check where they stand in your ratings?

Please do not confuse anti-reservation with anti-affirmative action. Reservation is one of the worse practices of affirmative action and even in the land of affirmative action this practice had been abolished as unconstitutional. There are better ways.

Monday, May 29, 2006

May 29, 2005. 55 per cent of the voters in France said no to the ratification of the proposed constitution of the European Constitution. Some 6580 kilometres away something remotely insignificant happened. 365 days and 238 posts later, what began as mindless musings of an unmindful mind finds itself as a beverage divider.

Q What would you do with 365 used rubbers?A Melt them down, make a tire, and call it a Goodyear.

Reading my erstwhile boss' blog, inspired me to post that first post. And the 238 posts were definitely better (for me) than 365 rubbers. The restrictive features in the blog as a medium of expression being limited. Posting unanonymously is one of them. But that is not deterrent enough for venting out the justifiable rants and the occasional praise.

Thanks to the support of fellow bloggers and readers for over a thousand comments and a counter that reads in excess of 15,000. It was definitely a good year. Looking forward for more.

Friday, May 26, 2006

The Prime Minister thinks, "the matter is already settled." And he is "pained to see the agonising experience the youth of the country are undergoing." "They should call off their strike and I assure that the government will find a viable and credible way to protect the interest of all sections of the society," he says. Who is he trying to fool? Even he knows for sure (but can't speak his mind out) that this present system of quota based positive discrimination sucks. It does much less then the intended good for the beneficiaries and restricts others from making use of the unutilised capacities. End result - country in the dumps.

Saturday, May 20, 2006

Reservation is a dirty word. It symbolises exclusion rather than what it purportedly strives to achieve - an inclusive egalitarian society. Of late I have been reading a lot of pro-reservation/quota literature and though there are many substantial arguments in them, the idea of forming watertight compartments for the betterment of the historically underprivileged doesn't seem to be convincing enough. Instead of accepting that the present percentage-based straitjacketed formula is seriously flawed, the champions for the caste-based cause take refuge in the census and emerge out with percentages.

The less-privileged should be given leverage, rather than made to sit in reserved compartments, while the others (more privileged by virtue of caste and caste alone) get involved in a fist fight for the seats in the general compartment, where again the more meritorious of the less-privileged wouldn't (and shouldn't) be denied a berth. There's a lot wrong with the present system and instead of rectifying what's wrong, the number game's on. Statistics is a very helpful tool in analysing happenings and predicting trends, but a small seemingly innocent tweak here can cause a huge difference there.

The for-reservations lobby tends to view the non-beneficiaries of the reservation system as a homogenous urban, well-fed and deep-pocketed class. A look at the same set of statistics they quote from, will tell how far the realities are.

Let me do some crystal gazing. Reservations once in place are very difficult to roll back. In case the formula of quota leading to advancement works, the have-nots of today will become have-mores tomorrow. An improvement in the socio-economic and educational stature will ensure that they occupy a chunk of the 50 percent (if not lesser) open seats, coupled with multilevel benefits in exemptions, scholarships, jobs (both government and private), promotions. Where does it leave the progeny of the 'privileged' class of today? Without the necessary avenues, they've either become militants or have been sidelined in the margins of the society - the 'neo-backwards.' The righting of a 3000-year-old historic wrong. Social justice in its truest form.

My crystal's developing cracks, so it's back to the present to the lens of my camera. A peaceful anti-reservation rally of thousands - medicos, engineers, chartered accountants, lawyers, corporate executives, university students, teachers, parents, school students... under the banner of Youth for Equality marched from Maulana Azad Medical College (Dilli Gate) in the older Delhi to the vicinity of Jantar Mantar in Lutyen's New Delhi. The sloganeering was saved for the last - it was silent throughout - with big-mouth Navjot Singh Siddhu (perhaps the only politician to come out so openly in support of the anti-quota movement) trying to build a youth-leader image for himself in his typical exaggerated style and management guru Shiv Kheda motivating the protesters.

Thursday, May 18, 2006

Often people ask for answers to questions which might not have any realistic relevance. Given my usual antipathy about how things are done in this world, many friends and colleagues have put this hypothetical question before me, "What would you do if you were the Prime Minister?" How am I supposed to answer that question? The average age of Indian Prime Ministers is one at which I would like to blissfully lead a retired life, with great-grandchildren and all. On second thoughts, "I'll remove that column from government forms which asks for religion," I reply.

Religion to me is a very private affair, I don't like to discuss my beliefs and practices but often I have to, much to the displeasure of many. I don't like to visit temples - at least the modern ones. The gaudy architecture and the vulgar 'religious' imitation of popular Hindi film item-numbers being a few of the reasons. Religion is supposed to answer the unanswered. It delves into the unknown realms and fills the gaps of cognitive human knowledge and therefore should provide solace to the troubled soul. But when religion becomes an identity, things become complex and the troubles of the soul increase. When I complain about the unearthly noises at a time when I'm ready to depart for the oneiric realm, I am antireligious.

Is religion keeping the whole neighbourhood awake just because something you had yearned for happened, and you want to thank someone above for that? Or is religion about chanting something that I can't even remotely comprehend? Does religion ask for a circumcision check before thrusting that dagger into the abdomen? I don't want the answers. I've already witnessed the consequences.

'Netaji' - a name which might rank as one of the most common prefixes for youth clubs. The locality where I grew up, also had its fair share of 'Netaji Clubs,' and two portraits adorned the sitting room wall of the Bengali families - Rabindranath Tagore and Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. January 23 every year was the big day. On that shivering cold winter morning, year after year, we kids were wide awake well before dawn. As the prabhat pheri (literally morning walk, but not exactly) did its rounds along the winding roads of the city, the chant "Netaji tumi phire esho (Netaji you come back)," sounded almost a plead. The mystery surrounding his death gave him a different stature and different versions did their regular rounds. The conspiracy theories were especially interesting and almost convincing.

The Shanawaz Khan Committee (1956), GD Khosla Committee (1970-74) had reached the conclusion that Netaji Subash Chandra Bose died in a plane crash over Taiwan on August 18, 1945. The latest Manoj Kumar Mukherjee Commission report was rejected in the Parliament yesterday. It had deviated from the stand of the earlier commissions and stated that though Netaji is dead, he didn't die in the said plane crash and the story was a hoax to help Netaji escape. The theory of Bhagwanji-Gumnami Baba being Netaji was also refuted. Gumnami Baba was a hermit, who died in Faizabad on September 16, 1985 and had striking similarities with the leader of the Indian National Army. Morarji Desai, the then Prime Minister had also rejected the GD Khosla Commission report in 1978.

Bengalis in the heart of their hearts wouldn't like to know for sure that Netaji died and how. The mystery surrounding it helps maintain his heroism on a different plane from the other contemporary national leaders. Whether Netaji died on August 18, 1945 in Taiwan or forty years later in Uttar Pradesh or someplace and sometime else doesn't matter much. What does is that the enigma lives on...

Last month an official endeavour took me to the fringes of South Delhi - the road that leads to the new boomtown called Gurgaon, originally Gurugram (it was the location of Guru Dronacharya's ashram in the Mahabharata). MG Road in cities across the country expands to Mahatma Gandhi Road, but this is the Mehrauli-Gurgaon road, where the Municipal Corporation of Delhi rebuked by the Supreme Court let loose the bulldozers. The once hip-and-happenin' malls look ghastly; whatever is left of them hangs precariously. On this road a little far ahead are farmhouses - the semi-rural retreat of the urban rich. Here is housed the Sanskriti Pratishthan's (Sanskriti Foundation) Sanskriti Kendra - a terracotta treasure house. I couldn't help but let my digicam shutter open and close relentlessly. Here are the results.